Kiss of Death
by KeptinKrunch
Summary: Grim Reapers have one job to trump all others; sending dying mortals' souls to their Judgment. Lord Death had taught Kid that since he was born. Yet when Kid claims he would do anything to bring a symmetrical girl back to life, it comes time for him to learn death's one loophole, though it might send her to a fate worse than death itself. Eventual KidxOC, with SoMa canon.
1. A Rendezvous

**A/N:** **Hello, All! I'll keep this short and sweet; this takes place after the end of the Anime, but I might incorporate some elements from the Manga. And Kilik/Ox/Harvar/Kim will get lines here and there.**

**I'm going to be taking Kid's OCD as a fairly serious personal issue, too. Sometimes I'll spin it for comedy, but it'll be a source of major angst throughout. Don't worry about the depressing-versus-funny ratio, though; most stuff gets lighter and lighter as the story goes on. I'm starting off pretty heavy, though.**

**(I actually posted this on another account a few months ago, but took it down since I kinda disliked it. I'm reposting it cuz I cleaned it up a bit, and I hope that you guys like it too)**

**Chapter One:A Rendezvous**

* * *

Golden eyes flickered back and forth across the Death Room. The expansive area was empty, save for the spiky-robed deity directly in front of him. The hair on the back of Kid's neck was prickling and he sighed to himself. Though he knew there wasn't a Kishin nearby, it was instinct for the reaper to scan his surroundings when the unease currently in his stomach started poking at his nerves.

"Kid, we have to be going," his father said. Lord Death, usually comical in his squid-like mask and high-pitched voice, looked at his son seriously from behind the ancient, frightening mask he only wore for business. Kid nodded, his stomach beginning to shift from uneasy to churning. His father gave him an appraising look, Kid keeping his face as straight as possible, as the two moved towards the central mirror. Kid took in a silent, deep breath as his father traced his gloved fingers over the mirror weaving a pattern so intricate that a human's fingers would not have been able to duplicate it, even after a thousand years of practice. The reaper-in-training placed his hand against the mirror next to his father, feeling a wrenching sensation as he was dragged across time and space.

After the defeat of Asura the previous year and the recent – and permanent – connection of his first two Lines of Sanzu, Lord Death had begun to increase Kid's training as a reaper. It was simple at first; just a mixture of lessons on the duties of a Death God and how to extract dying souls from their bodies without destroying them. It was all done from inside the Death Room, usually with a few cups of coffee and the comforting smell of an old tome. But that had to end at some point.

That was when Lord Death began taking Kid on the Death Rounds, where they would take the souls of the dying and send them to the Judgment Plane for, well, judgment, as Lord Death called it. Though, strictly speaking, he couldn't leave Death City, Lord Death was able to use his mirror to move his consciousness around for the Rounds, creating an almost solid, but not quite whole image of himself in front of the dying humans.

And, though Kid wouldn't dare talk about it, he hated the Death Rounds more than anything else. It wasn't the death that bothered him; he was used to it after killing hundreds of Kishins and Witches. It was that he knew, someday, it would be his best friends that he was watching die, then clawing _their_ souls out of their corpses to send to whatever personal hell or heaven awaited them.

Kid and his father materialized in a large city on a day as dismal as Kid's mood. The rain wasn't falling, though; Time itself halted during the Death Rounds for all but the Reapers and the one they had an appointment with, in order to give Lord Death enough time to converse with the dying without an audience. Kid followed the projection of his father, avoiding the frozen people in his way. The two shinigami turned around a corner, into an alley reminiscent of those in Death City. From that alley, they turned into another, Kid's nausea growing with every step. With every Round, he was one step closer to taking Maka or Black*Star or, God forbid, one of the Thompson's souls.

The pair weaved deeper into the back-alleys. A black cat obstructed Kid's path as he turned a sharp corner, its back in mid arch and mouth wide in a hiss. He stepped over it carefully as his father stopped a few paces in front of him. Death the Kid halted beside the god, the toes of his shoes almost touching the pool of blood spilling from a dying girl.

Time hadn't stopped for her, and she was struggling for breath. By the amount of blood on the pavement of the alley, she couldn't have had more than a few seconds to go when time stopped. Her hands were gripping the identical gashes going down her sides, seeming to stretch downward from her armpit to her upper-thigh. She was leaning against the side alley, part of her face against a brick wall as she gasped in agony. A man was frozen crouching beside her, a knife in one hand and a lustful grin plastered across his blood-soaked face.

"Nicolai Moore?" Lord Death asked gently as he crouched down beside her. Using what seemed to be on the near end of her energy, she glanced up at him. Kid was sure that he was going to be sick; she was his age, if not a year younger. She might have competed for a chance into DWMA. She could have dated Kilik, or had sleepovers with Kim and Jackie. Coffee-brown hair, matted with blood, fell into her face as she looked up at them.

"P-please…" she stuttered, sn emerald green eye looking upwards at the sky before flickering closed.

Lord Death cupped the side of her face with his solid, gloved hand – instead of the large, boxy gloves he wore during the school day, he was wearing thin ones that highlighted how long and skeletal his fingers truly were – and whispered an ancient spell in her ear. It was just an image of him, but he still looked real, and could still conduct business. She opened her eye slightly; though Kid could tell that she was still dying, her anguish had been lessened.

"I'm dying?" she asked hoarsely as she looked at the deity, then let out a strangled, ill-tempered laugh. "Then again, what… what could I expect after this?"

"I'm afraid so," he said. "But I have a favor to ask you first."

"A favor for Death?" the tiniest sarcastic smile graced the half of the light-crimson lips that showed from underneath her hair. "Guess 'm all ears."

"My son, Death the Kid, is training to take over my position as a Grim Reaper. He needs practice sending souls to the next plane," he said, gesturing to the boy standing a few paces behind. "With your permission, I would like to have him be the one to take your soul. Of course, there are some risks, as he is untrained. Your soul might be damaged in the process of its removal - and for your generosity, should you choose to accept it, your judgement will be less harsh. If you would prefer me to carry out the ritual, I would completely understand."

"I'll take Death Junior," she said without hesitation, her body quivering with effort to keep breathing.

"Thank you for your consent," Lord Death said, taking a step backwards. Kid moved forward uncertainly; he really, really hoped he would be able to do this right, for her sake. This would be nothing like the last one, he promised himself, nothing like his absolute failure with the man who had last consented. His feet splashed in the blood around her, sending drops of crimson liquid onto his black trousers. Kid felt a fit of symmetry-based compulsion fit coming on, but he swallowed it down, like the lunch that he was forcing to stay down his throat. He wasn't going to let this girl's last moments on this earth be filled with him ranting. He would complete his daily ritual three times when he got home, he promised himself as he swallowed once again, forcing the bile down his throat as he kneeled down in the blood beside her, staining his knees unevenly.

"Are you sure?" he asked, trying to mimic his father's gentle manner. Something deep in her eyes snagged his, drawing him in. It felt like it clicked inside his mind, like a key in a lock. He didn't want her soul to be damaged in the process, like the man whose soul he had taken before her. "I'm not very experienced."

"I'm sure y-you'll do fine, Tiger," she breathed raggedly, glancing up at the stripes in his hair as the corners of her mouth tugged up slightly. "But this is my first time, so try to be gentle."

Kid let his mouth twitch upwards into a slight smile at the innuendo, though he felt his heart sink. She was dying, and still making jokes? She might have gotten along well with Soul, had she lived in Death City. He sighed out in preparation, gathering himself, before speaking.

"What I'm going to do is fairly simple and painless," he began, but was cut off by a second raspy laugh.

"I dunno what your definition o-of 'painless' is, but dying sure as h-hell isn't," she muttered, stumbling over the words. "And if I can ask, how am I even still… still alive?"

"You'll technically stay alive until we take your soul," Kid replied. "I'm sorry that I can't do anything more for the pain. Now, I'm going to remove your soul from your body and send it to Judgment. Do you want a minute to pray?"

"It wo-on't matter," she breathed, her head falling back against the wall behind her and her long bangs brushing to the side of her face. "Just start already."

"Alright."

Kid looked to his father for approval, which he gave with a small nod of his holographic head. Kid turned back to the girl – Nicolai – and took her chin gently in one hand. The soul dwelt deep within the heart, but had to be coaxed out through the mouth when the Reapers collected them; souls eaten by Kishin were often damaged from their forceful removal. Kid briefly wondered why Fate had sent them to collect her soul with a Kishin standing beside her and looking ready to eat it, but he shoved the thought away.

As he brought her head forward, her murmuring something unintelligible but by her pained yet amused expression probably another insinuation, his mind temporarily blanked. Before he remembered what he was supposed to be doing, his mind went back to his most animalistic instinct; searching for symmetry. As his mind flashed between the two sides of her face, his golden irises widened. Sure, her hair was covered unevenly in layers of her blood, but if that were gone, as well as the cut on her cheek…

He brushed a stray piece of her bangs to the other side of her face, attempting to part her hair straight down the middle. Her eyes flickered open questioningly, as if to ask what the god-in-training was trying to pull.

"I don't believe it," he breathed, a glow rushing through his eyes and pulling up the sides of his mouth. "No way."

"Not tha-at I'm… eager or anything… but aren't I s-supposed to be dead by now?" she asked, clutching one side more forcefully than the other.

"No. Not yet. Now, sit up straight," Kid commanded as he moved backwards slightly. He needed to be completely sure, without a trace of a doubt that she was. She gave a halfhearted flinch as she tried to sit up straighter on his order, but she clearly didn't have enough strength to do so. Kid sighed and placed one hand on her shoulder and the other on her waist, scooting her up against the alley's wall.

"Kid," his father began, concerned. He was ignored by the adolescent reaper, though.

"Precise and exact," he practically whispered. "So perfect. Impossible…"

"Thanks," she replied weakly. "A girl c-can only try."

"Kid." This time it was a warning. Kid couldn't bear to look away from the girl though, not with her symmetry.

"Father, we can't take her. She's symmetrical," Kid insisted, aiming the statements at his father pleadingly though his eyes still were locked on hers. "Please, she can't die, she's a work of art! So perfectl-"

"No," the God said to him plainly, his surprisingly expressive mask expressing his stoniness. "There's a plan for her in the universe. She must die today, and her soul must be sent to Judgment."

"Father –"

"Kid." His father's voice had taken on a harsh tone, one reserved for times like this. Before turning to his son, he muttered the charm that would halt time for the girl as well so to not make her suffer, caught indefinitely between life and death while he was scolding his son. "You can't save them. There will be ten thousand more symmetrical girls in your lifetime, maybe more. Not to mention the children, the babies, the pitiful souls that beg you to take them before their time if you accidentally let them know that you can. You have to let them go on, and die when it's their time."

"But…" Kid began, but trailed off slightly, knowing that he would only restate that she was symmetrical, and couldn't die in such a demeaning, miserable way. "Please."

"I'm sorry, Kid, but I can't allow you to defy order, no matter who you want to save." Lord Death placed a hand on his son's shoulder, and though his father was merely a projection sent through his mirror, Kid could almost feel the sensation. "I'll take it from here."

Kid didn't respond. He glanced from the girl back to the man crouching a few feet away, her killer. He could recognize his frozen soul; it was one on his Father's list.

A Kishin.

A Kishin that had just murdered a symmetrical girl.

His Reaper mind processed the information at a decent speed, but far slower than his still human body took to act on the impulse. Before he could stop himself, he chanted an ancient spell, the syllables beyond comprehension, which released time from the grip of the Reapers.

"-bleed, pretty," the man said, as he had been in the middle of saying before time froze on him. It took him all of half a second to realize that Kid was standing in front of him, but less than that was used up by the young Reaper wrenching the knife from his hands.

"Kid-!" Lord Death yelled, but not before the young reaper had already severed one of the man's arms. The Kishin stumbled backwards as he approached again, groping at the stump of an arm remaining.

"You disgust me," Kid hissed, not noticing or caring about the blood splattered on his suit. He approached the scrambling man determinedly, who had managed to find his way to his feet as his blood poured out of his remaining nub. The Kishin darted around a corner in the alley, Kid summoning Beelzebub to follow. Before he could take off, a shiver raced up his arm. He spun and saw his father placing his corporeal hand on his forearm.

"No," his father said firmly, staring at his son from behind the holes in his mask. Kid paused momentarily, glancing back at his father.

But the hesitation was over as soon as it had begun, and Kid yanked his arm out of the god's grip and sped after the Kishin. Lord Death sighed, but didn't follow.

"S-Sir Death?" a voice asked from behind him. Lord Death turned, seeing the still-dying girl still struggling for breath as she was coated in the heavy rain now falling freely from the clouds above. "What the-e hell's going on?"

"Kid tends to lose his temper when it comes to Kishin," Lord Death sighed, placing his formless hand upon the girl's head. "I'm quite sorry you had to witness that."

"I've seen w-worse," she replied, still clutching her sides. "So, death now? I h-hate to be pushy, but I kinda have some… issues, here."

"Of course," he responded, and with a quick wave of his hand she was frozen in time again. Lord Death sighed. It wasn't good for a soul to be paused and reanimated so many times. Especially when her body was undergoing so much damage.

It was right then that Kid reappeared from around the corner, drenched in the blood of the Kishin.

"…Father," Kid began, but was cut off by the god.

"Go home, Kid," Lord Death said with a light sigh. "Meet me in the Death Room tomorrow at two."

"Anything. I'll do anything," he stated plainly as he looked over at the girl again.

"Home."

Kid didn't protest as the ancient magic sent him sweeping across space and back to Nevada, the last thing he saw being his father leaning over the symmetrical girl's corpse.

The last thing he saw before his vision was clouded with tears.

**So, starting off with a symmetry-crazed Kid and a dying symmetrical girl.**

**Not cliché at **_**all**_**.**

**Sorry, but I just feel that any DTK romance needs symmetry. He's kinda all about appearances. Don't worry, it's gonna be an important emotional piece of the story later. I'm not just gonna let them be happy with the way that they look! That would be giving freebies!**

**Please, please review, drop by any flames/concrit you want. After all, you spent the last few minutes reading this heap; you might as well spend ten seconds on a comment. I know you've got an opinion.**

**Virtual caramel and hot cocoa to all!**


	2. Compulsion and Confession

**Notes are at the end! I hope you enjoy, but I guess a small TW for OCD ritual-based could-be-classified-as self harm, I guess?**

**Chapter 2: Compulsion and Confession**

* * *

Kid stumbled through the doors of Gallows Manor, blinded by unshed tears. Through turbulent thoughts and a ringing in his ears, he barely made out Liz asking him how training went from her seat on the couch, some television show blaring in the background.

"Don't want to talk about it," he managed, trying to keep his voice straight but knowing that he failed. He forced his way up the stairs and through the double-doors to his room, sinking down onto his perfectly square, black bed and letting the hot tears stream down his face as the doors slammed shut behind him.

_This is the rest of my life,_ he thought to himself bitterly, gripping his comforter in wiry yet strong fists. _Death after death, love after love, friend after friend; all until I'm as old and alone as my father and raise an heir just to be rid of it._

He fell back onto the mattress, squeezing his eyes closed as he knotted one hand in his black and white striped hair. He could still feel her blood mixed with her murderer's, wet and sticky on his body. Suddenly, all of the impulses he'd been shoving away and ignoring came flooding back, overpowering every other emotion.

"I'm filthy," he muttered to himself while his eyes widened in revelation. The salty drops of water still flowed down his cheeks as he ripped off his usually pristine suit and threw it to the farthest corner of his room; the bloodstained opal tie resembling his father's mask was thrown harshly against a wall, shattering into a hundred crystalline pieces as he began rummaging desperately through his closet for new clothes. "Unclean garbage, asymmetrical waste…"

He pulled on the new suit quickly, feeling the sense of release from his compulsion that he ached for. But the urge wasn't gone yet. He felt overpowered to complete a ritual he hadn't been forced to do in ages; he needed to wash his hands. Searing-hot water, rubbed-raw skin, and acid-like soap would destroy all of his impurity and unworthiness. He ran to his bathroom, his hands clenched into fists. After rolling up his sleeves evenly, he began scrubbing his hands frantically, pumping as much soap as could fit in his palms and raking his fingernails over the painstakingly-moisturized, soft flesh.

"Kid!" The call came from outside his door, and he could easily tell that it was Liz from the tone. He didn't answer, being focused on his task, prompting the weapon to let herself in. Though she was usually annoyed by his OCD on missions, at their home she had the time and patience to be a bit gentler, especially when she could tell something deep inside of him was spurring the attack - and whatever it was happened to be was a serious issue. "What happened?"

"I'm busy," he hissed, not looking up as his hands started to become streaked with red lines from his nails, the harsh soap burning his fresh skin.

"Are you _washing_?" Liz asked as she saw the reaper frenziedly cleaning his hands, looking at him in shock. "You haven't done that since we first moved in! What's wrong?"

Kid didn't answer again, and she walked closer to see the tears glistening on his pale face. She immediately took a step backwards; virtually from the minute they moved to Gallows Manor, Kid had been a strong pillar that supported her life, albeit an increasingly neurotic one. Whatever had gone on during the training with his dad must've been awful for him to break down into his compulsiveness like that. And, since she had never seen him this bad before, she did the only thing she really could do; she sat down on his bed to wait for him to finish his ritual. As she sat, Patti crept into the room.

"Sissy?" the girl asked, her voice quiet as she sat down next to her sister. "What's wrong with Kid-kun?"

"I don't know, but whatever it is, it's bad," she whispered back, glancing at the reaper. Though his OCD was usually annoying and occasionally comical, to see him so broken and fierce, muttering under his breath while rubbing his hands raw, was nothing short of alarming.

"What do we do?" Patti questioned, worry creeping into her normally light voice. Liz wrapped her little sister into a one-armed hug for support, seeing the fear on her face.

"We wait for him to finish."

The sisters sat in complete stillness and silence as they watched their meister. Patti bit her lower lip as her bright blue eyes wavered with tears of worry. She loved her big brother, the hero who saved her and Sissy from the streets. He was her Kid-kun, the funniest, weirdest, silliest guy she had ever known, though it was all in spite of himself. But now, he was in what she thought of as his Scary Kid persona. It wasn't like when he was Badass Kid, who she thought was really, really cool. Badass Kid took down tons of bad guys at once and managed to not get a speck of dirt on himself. Scary Kid terrified her. Scary Kid wasn't really Kid at all, just all of his obsessiveness spilling out at once and blocking the rest of the world. Blocking out_ her_.

After twenty minutes, the reaper began to slow down; he was running out of soap and his three-word rants about disgust were fewer and farer in between. He dried his hands on the plush towel, the new flesh gleaming a painful red, and leaned his head against the wall. His single, heaving sob echoed through the otherwise silent room. Liz and Patti moved towards him at once, both of them enveloping the boy in a large hug.

"Kid," Liz said softly as she pulled away, her sister's eyes reflecting her compassion. "Can you tell us what happened?"

"You won't understand," he said, his voice as raw as the pink flesh on his hands. "The rest of my life… centuries, millennia, God knows how long, I'm going to rip people's fading souls out of their dead, mutilated corpses. That's my life, and my child's life, and their kid's life after that."

"Kid, you're a reaper," Liz reasoned as she and Patti slowly moved Kid towards his bed so that they could sit down, instead of awkwardly crowd in his bathroom. "It's your job to… do that."

"But I can't do it, Liz!" he yelled, golden eyes piercing her and glowing fiercely as both girls jumped backwards, surprised at his volume. "Because someday, it's not just going to be some random soul! Someday, I'm going to be taking _your_ soul from _your_ body! I'm going to have to see_ each and every one of you_ **_die_**!"

Silence accompanied his outburst,both Thompson sisters looking at Kid in shock.

"You've known that for years," Liz said after a minute, Patti throwing her arms around him as she murmured, "Kid-Kun, it's gonna be okie-dokie."

"But I didn't realize how hard it would be back then," his voice had suddenly grown soft, so soft that Patti and Liz could barely hear it. "I know now."

"Whose soul did you have to take, Kid?" Patti asked, equally quiet. "Is it someone we know?"

"No, no," Kid said, clenching and unclenching his covers rhythmically with his aching hands. "It was just some girl in an alley. But she was…"

He didn't have to finish, as Liz completed the sentence quietly; "Symmetrical?"

The raven-haired head moved up and down slightly, his eyes obscured by the mess of hair. His voice was bitter far beyond his years. "She was a masterpiece. Even soaked in blood, cut open like a fish, she was… breathtaking," he said with a moan of loss, like an art collector who had a Da Vinci in his grip, only to let it slip away to a higher bidder. "And she died lying in an alley among broken bottles and trash. I felt like I needed to save her. I would have done anything in that moment to bring her to life – I think I still would. When I saw her, I just felt… complete. I wanted her to be alive, just so I could feel so whole again, so that I could bask in her symmetry for a few more minutes. And when you and Patti and Maka and Chrona… any of you, really… it's going to be so much worse."

"So, what happened?" Liz asked, her voice as soothing as she could make it. Kid being so bitter wasn't necessarily _un_common, but it was strange for him to be so depressed about his future. He had been raised for it, after all.

"Father began to take her soul, and I realized she was so…pure, and I asked him to let her live. He told me that he couldn't bend the rules for her and I'd see tens of thousands of people I want to save in my life. They all are going to die, and I'm going to just… exist. He told me to go back home, but the man, the one that killed her, he was still there, frozen, that goddamn smile on his face…"

"Kid-kun, did you… take his soul?" Patti asked. Kid nodded, his eyes shut, stray tears still making their way down his cheeks.

"I shouldn't have; but I couldn't help it. He was on the list anyways. I just went at him with his knife. I killed him in the same alley… That makes his blood on my hands; it's on my hands…"

Kid made to stand up, most likely to go back to the sink, but Liz and Patti caught him and pulled him back down.

"You used a knife?" Liz asked incredulously, looking at her meister. Not only was that an asymmetrical weapon, but Kid hated anything that could get blood on him; swords, knives, kunai, daggers, even scythes.

"I wasn't myself," he replied simply. "I couldn't think. All I knew was that she – a shining light of purity in a sea of dark, wretched, unbalanced waste – was killed, though at least he spared her soul, but her life was robbed from her body, because of that man's bloodlust. I had to do something."

The boy laid farther back, his hair falling into his bloodshot eyes. His two weapons leaned beside him, looking over at him worriedly.

"Kid-kun," Patti said, her childlike voice full of concern. "You know that no matter what, we love you, right?"

"Mmm," he hummed noncommittally.

"You saved us, Kid," Liz supported her sister. "You got us off the streets, you managed to get me clean, and now we're Death Scythes. We owe everything to you."

"Yeah," he said, giving the pair the tiniest smile. Liz could tell that it was his 'I want Patti to feel better' smile, but she knew it was a good sign that Kid was trying to reassure the blonde pistol.

"And don't you forget it!" Patti yelled happily, glad her sister helped make her point, and that Kid wasn't Scary Kid anymore. "So when bad stuff happens, just remember all the good stuff you did for us!"

"I'll remember," he said, looking at the girl. "Thank you."

Patti grinned and pecked Kid on the cheek before Liz whispered a quick "Hey, Patti, you want to work on that thing you were talking about earlier?" and the girl bounded out of the room with a determined nod. Liz looked to Kid. His eyes had lost the manic pain and rage of just a few minutes prior, but knowing that just because he had moved past his usually brief 'absolute meltdown' stage didn't mean that the battle was anywhere close to over. Next came the luckily somewhat-short unnerving calm with the brief relapses into compulsiveness, then long depression, then a medium pouring-himself-into-all-work-he-sees-to-distract- himself, and then the eventual acceptance. At least, that was how it usually went.

"So, love at first sight?" she asked, lying down next to him and looking up at his ceiling, a large glass chandelier hanging from it.

"No," he said, also gazing up at the lights of the chandelier. "Not love."

"What, then?"

"It wasn't really this attachment to her, it was… it was what she symbolized," he said with a shrug. "That's my future; watching beauty die and then sending it on to the next realm. I didn't really understand that before, but she showed it to me."

"Did your dad actually, you know, take her soul?" Liz asked tenderly, her eyes moving sideways to where the reaper laid. He didn't return her gaze, but continued to stare upwards at the ceiling as he replied.

"If he did, I couldn't watch, and I don't think he would have let me anyways," he sighed. "I snapped on her killer, Liz. My father may not know much about me, but he can tell when something's wrong. It didn't help that I chopped him up."

"You chopped him up?" Liz asked. "Like, into pieces?"

"Eight of them," he said calmly. She shivered as she looked at his emotionless form.

"All because a symmetrical girl died?" she clarified.

"All because he killed her," he corrected. He paused for a second before looking at her, his golden eyes looking molten. Maybe he wasn't in his emotionless phase yet after all, she considered. "Liz, I'm afraid."

"What of?"

"Myself." He was whispering, or at least close to it, his emotions seeming to be bouncing around within him. "I didn't just kill him; I released him from the time-freeze beforehand so I could see the pain on his face as his life ebbed away. I wanted to see him suffer, Liz. What makes me better than one of the Kishin? I'm supposed to be the keeper of order and balance in the world after my father… after he departs. How can I live with myself?"

"Because you didn't do it because you liked it," she reasoned. "You did it in the heat of passion, to avenge some poor dead girl. And he was on the list…"

"Still."

Liz sighed and looked over at him. Kid had never been too bothered by death before, not to mention taking a Kishin's soul.

"You should really go to sleep," she decided, as it was her go-to remedy for when Patti was worried. "We have Black*Star's birthday party tomorrow and-"

"I'm not going."

"Do you want us to stay here with you, or…"

"I need to be alone tomorrow."

She paused a second before asking, "You aren't going to do anything stupid, are you?"

"Stupid?" he asked, almost as bitter as before. "It isn't that simple anymore, Liz. I've permanently connected two of my Lines of Sanzu. I can't die. It would be a paradox. Who escorts death's soul when he dies – well, I will for my father, but since I'm as strong of a reaper as him at this point, he can't physically bear to take my soul." Kid paused for a second as he let Liz absorb the information, before continuing with a half-hearted reassurance. "I just need some time to myself, to think."

"Okay," she replied, moving her hand towards his and squeezing it gently. "But you know Patti was right. Just try and think about what you did for us when you get down next time. Without you, we would have probably become Kishin. And we owe you for that, Kid. We owe you forever."

"Thanks," he said softly, squeezing her hand in return. She nodded, smiling at the younger boy, before sitting up.

"Sleep," she commanded, with an unusual firmness in her voice. "It'll be good for you."

"If you say so."

Liz stood and walked out of the room, hopeful that she might have done something to help her meister. She cast a smile back to him as she eased the door closed, hoping he didn't see the fear for him in her eyes.

_God, Kid's going crazy and he isn't even a full-blown reaper yet,_ she thought to herself as she leaned against the doorframe.

_I would never want to be immortal_.

* * *

**Sorry for the poorly written angst/depressed crap. It gets better later, scout's honor! (Though I wasn't ever a scout…) All in all, a bit more angsty than I'm used to writing, but whatevs.**

**I really like writing Older Sister!Liz and Little Sister!Patti, though. It makes for a nice relationship dynamic. Opens the road for the upcoming elements, a bit more than Friend!Liz/Patti or Love Interest!Liz/Patti does. I guess I just think like that because love triangles aren't my jam. I prefer troubled, two person relationships.**

**Thank you to the four reviewers last time; Confetti108, theanimegal, ThatAnimeChick, and the ever elusive Guest! You guys should really check out Confetti108's story, _For the Love of Christi_, if you like mine. It's pretty awesome.**

**Please review, and v****irtual caramel and chocolate chip cookies to all you favorites/alerters out there!**


	3. The Living Dead

**(A/N is at the bottom)**

**Chapter 3: The Living Dead**

* * *

Lord Death stood in the aptly named Death Room, gazing out at the sea of crosses before him. Each symbolized a death that a reaper had been called to collect for, and the cluttered graveyard sprawled for countless miles under the Nevada dessert. Small clouds swirled over the sandy ground, their tails waving back and forth like small animals. He sighed through his mask. Kid was going through the same phase of training that the god went through, and his father before him. The first death that made him realize what was happening, what he was becoming. It was the worst part of the job; the times when it was someone you wanted to save more than anything else, but couldn't. He knew exactly how that felt.

And that was why the girl wasn't dead.

Well, she wasn't exactly alive either.

Frozen in time, she was curled into a fetal position on the floor of the Death Room. Drops of blood clung to her fingers, disobeying gravity at the angles that in other circumstances only a picture could capture. Her mouth was pressed down into a thin line as she awaited her untimely demise, hardened by the single tear, previously unnoticed by both him and his son, on her right cheek.

Lord Death sighed to himself again as he looked at her. Though he was going to regret putting his son through it, he was going to have to use her as a test. Part of him wanted to tell himself not to, that it was too early in Kid's training to present him with the cheat codes, but he knew that it had to be done – and considering the rate he was connecting his Lines of Sanzu, it had to be done soon. His father had displayed a Reaper's power when one of his friends had died, and even though Lord Death still regretted the decision he made, he accepted that his father was right to show him the power of a Grim Reaper. His decision taught him how to walk the path of a reaper; not good nor evil, but exactly between the two; in perfect balance with light and dark. And now, it was Kid's turn to learn.

It was his turn to decide the fate of a soul.

* * *

Kid was still staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom when Liz crept into his room a while past one in the afternoon.

"I taught you how to knock, you know," he said as she closed the door silently behind her, clearly assuming he was still asleep. She let out a shriek of surprise before glancing at the reaper. His golden eyes were cold as they looked over to her, reminding her of her own when she lived on the streets a few years back.

"Hey, I knew how to knock, I just didn't feel like it," she replied, clearly remembering the 'Closed Door Incident' the month after she and Patti moved in. "Though in hindsight, I probably should have."

"It would have saved me a lot of grief," he said with a small shrug as his eyes returned to his ceiling. "So, why are you in here?"

"Patti and I are about to go to the party, and she wanted me to leave something for you," she said, gesturing to the rolled up sheet of paper in her hand. "But, since you're up, I'll let her give it to you herself."

"What is it?"

"You'll just have to wait and see," she smiled, before opening the door and waving Patti inside, as she appeared to be standing on the other side in anticipation of her sister's return. She crept inside, but upon seeing Kid awake, threw herself into his arms with a giggle.

"Hey Kid-kun!" she yelled in his ear, making him wince yet sigh and cast her his common 'I'm going to be nice though you don't know how painful this is for me' half-smile.

"Morning, Patti," he said, propping himself up into a more upright position.

"I have a present for you," she said, as eager as a five-year old at their best friend's birthday party. "I made it myself!"

The blonde raced over to her sister and took the paper out of the older girl's hands. Bounding back over to Kid, she presented it to him while beaming. Patti could draw better than most people gave her credit for, and this drawing was a mark above her usual standard. It was a full-color drawing of their group – Patti always colored in her drawings – standing together in a loose semi-circle around Kid. Their forms were so precise that it almost looked like a photograph, though Kid knew that they had never posed for one.

"You like it?" she asked, blue eyes bright. It was clear from the dark bags under her eyes that she had worked on it well into the night, perhaps throughout the morning. He gave her a legitimate smile, grateful that she would neglect sleeping, an activity she took very, very seriously, to try and cheer him up.

He had never felt more powerful love for anything asymmetrical before.

"Yeah," he replied, his voice almost cracking as he accepted it gingerly, careful not to crinkle the edge of the page. "Thank you."

"You betcha!" Patti grinned. Liz rested against the door, manicured nails slipped into the pockets of her jeans as she watched the two.

"So are you going to come to the party?" she asked the younger meister as he began fishing through his drawers for a suitable frame. "They're going to be expecting us."

"No, I don't think so," he said as he gently placed the drawing into the frame before standing and putting it on his dresser, surrounded by many of Patti's other 'get well' drawings.

"Kay, well, even if you don't wanna come, we have to get going," Liz said. "But we'll make sure to be home right afterwards."

"Don't worry about me. I don't want to affect you with my problems," he said, his expression unchanging. "Feel free to stay out as late as you want."

"Even so, we'll be home before midnight," Liz decided. Though Kid knew that the girl would try as hard as possible to keep the promise, both of the sisters tended to go a bit overboard at parties. And Black*Star's party – mixed with a celebration of the New Year, since Black*Star just happened to be born on the midnight of New Year's Eve – was sure to be on the wilder side.

"Bye, Kid-Kun!" Patti yelled directly in his ear before she kissed his cheek again and left the room.

"Call us if you need us to come back," the elder reminded him, casting him a worried, but trusting smile before closing the door. "And don't spend New Year's Eve boxed up in here. At least watch the fireworks – they only come once a year."

"I have a millennia of new years to celebrate. I doubt this one will be too different from the last seventeen, or the next hundred."

"That's no excuse for missing it."

Kid sighed as he heard the two girls leave, Liz casting him a 'don't you try anything' look. He was partially glad that he had managed to convince them to go, to not be troubled by issues beyond them, but he didn't want to go and see his father. He knew that if Liz and Patti had stayed, they wouldn't let him go and see the god. They would keep him at home, skip everything they had planned, comfort him, and make him feel like an actual human being instead of a passing observer of their race.

But he also knew that he needed to see his father and apologize.

He groaned as he sat up, running a hand through his hair. Damn. It was not going to be a good day, he thought with a sigh as he began to put on an old outfit from the back of his wardrobe. His tie was shattered, and he didn't feel right wearing his suit without it. Though it hadn't mattered during the previous night, being otherwise distracted, it certainly did now. He would order another one when he got back from the Death Room, he decided quickly.

Instead, he picked out an old white dress-shirt, a grey vest on top of it, and a pair of black slacks on his slim legs. He rolled up the sleeves evenly on his shirt, feeling like he looked a bit like the teenage usher at their cousin's wedding.

No matter. He was an usher anyways, showing souls to their eternity with an air of formality and reeking of I-Don't-Want-to-be-Doing-This. He might as well look the part.

He walked downstairs with a sigh, turning into the dining room and grabbing an orange out of the fruit bowl in the middle of the table. He peeled it easily, managing to not get any of its juice onto his hands – now healed due to his reaper skin – and sighed as he looked down at the symmetrical slices.

Perfect.

Kid ate it quickly, half so that he wouldn't have to deal with the fact that he was destroying symmetry and half because he was legitimately hungry. He checked a clock above a large window; one forty five. Why did he ever agree to meet his father at an asymmetrical number like two? Well, two did make a duo of even ones. Perhaps the number could be worse, like five, he thought as he walked out into the main room of his large home, then out the front doors.

He sighed again as the Nevada sun hit him directly in the face. It wasn't as hot as it usually was, being midwinter, but it was still enough to make the average human break a sweat. Suddenly, he became slightly more thankful that he wasn't an average human.

He would be better off without this, he thought as he outstretched his hand and Beelzebub appeared with a crackle of Death Magic. But he was fine. Well, fine enough.

It only took a few seconds for him to reach the school after he stepped aboard his magical skateboard. Though it could take almost any shape he wanted, skateboards were practical. Well, it rode easier than a flying bike, not to mention it looked better.

He landed in front of the school and looked up at it, his emotions swirling. He had to apologize to his father, but he wasn't sorry. He was mad at himself for killing the Kishin like that, for losing control, but he wasn't _sorry_. Not in the slightest. If it happened again, he knew he'd take the same action as before and murder that bastard, not to mention not be able to take the girl's soul.

But his father wouldn't understand that. So he'd apologize and be back on bookwork for the next few months.

He was okay with that.

Kid walked inside, feeling a rush of cold air as he pulled open the door. He planned on walking straight through the door – well, if he had he made a plan, that would definitely have been included in it – but he found himself sprawled on the floor, having tripped over something. He glanced up with a groan, and was greeted by the image of Professor Stein leering at him from his rolling chair, a cigarette poking out between his teeth.

"Hello, Kid," the teacher greeted with a smile as he pushed off the floor, his chair wheeling away from the young Reaper, who was attempting to gracefully get to his feet. Kid saw the spiderlike limbs that held the wheels of the chair as he brushed off his shoulders and the waist of his pants, deciding that they were the culprit. "How's your winter break going?"

"Professor, what are you doing here?"

"I've been given permission to observe your… remedial lesson," the man grinned crookedly as he began rolling beside Kid as he walked to the Death Room. "You have no idea how lucky I am. No mortal has seen the Wraith ritual in millennia."

"The what?" Kid asked, feeling like the title was familiar, from a book somewhere hidden in the back recesses of his mind.

"I can't say too much else now; I'd ruin the data," Stein shrugged, before his chair ran into the door to the Death Room. With a jarring _BANG!_, he slumped over for a second, Kid feeling slightly smug, before the door opened and the two went inside.

The two walked – and rolled – the rest of the way in silence, Kid trying to unearth the meaning behind the word. _Wraith_. He knew he had heard it somewhere. Deep down, it meant something important, that his father had used it once, perhaps?

He decided he would figure out soon enough.

As soon as the guillotine-covered walkway stopped, opening into the expansive circular pavilion, Kid halted in his tracks. That was impossible. Completely impossible. The girl was there, curled on the floor of the Death Room like she was still in the alley. His father stood a few feet away, looking at his son with an almost silent sigh.

Before Kid could stop himself, he was across the room and kneeling beside her, brushing her hair aside to check, _to be completely and totally sure_, that she was as flawless as he had first thought. His father must have preformed magic on her, because the cut on her cheek was gone, along with the slashes down her sides.

"Kid, she _is _symmetrical," his father said as he looked down at her frozen body, a sigh of relief escaping the young man's lips. "As you said, her right and left mirror each other in every way, not even a stray freckle."

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked quietly, unable to tear his eyes away. Perfect symmetry. Beautiful, perfect symmetry, but personified. "Why would you say that to me when she's about to die?"

"Because she doesn't have to," Lord Death returned, his mask downcast and looking older than the carefree man he showed his students.

Kid stammered, grasping for words that didn't exist. He eventually settled for a small, "What?"

"Have you ever wondered what the Meisters were, Kid? Where they came from?" Stein asked, an ever so slightly sadistic grin on his face.

"I assumed that they were just mutated humans…" Kid said slowly.

"Well, there's a bit of a story behind that. The creation of the Wraiths is an ancient technique, though your father was the only one to truly use it," Stein explained, turning the bolt in his head backwards until it clicked. "You remember hearing about the Ancient Eight, the Great Old Ones?"

"Of course. Kishin Asura was one."

"They were each bestowed with a piece of Lord Death's soul upon their deaths before joining the group, successfully reanimating them." Stein paused, waiting for the information to sink in, before continuing. "It's an ancient necromancy technique, raising the dead. You just need to attach a piece of living soul to it to bring it back, like I did with Sid. But this, this is much more precise and neat. Your soul, should you choose to… loan, out a piece of it to her, would create a specimen that would never decay or age. She would be enforced with the magic of Reaper, unable to get so much as a scratch unless it is delivered by another Wraith, a powerful Kishin, or you with a Death Scythe. She'll live as long as you do, granted that she wasn't in the way of anyone too powerful."

Kid only stared. What was Stein saying? He turned to his father, silently requesting an answer.

"Wraiths were both humans and weapons whose children, if not weapons themselves, became the first meisters," Lord Death explained. "Excalibur was my first Wraith."

"Why would you-!"

"He was my closest friend while I was a boy," Lord Death replied, bowing his head slightly. "When he died, my father taught me the technique, which not only awoke his potential as one of the most powerful weapons in history, but also stirred the dormant madness in his soul, causing him to change over the centuries of life I gave him, into the creature he is today.

"Kid, this magic is dangerous," the god continued. "If the soul isn't strong enough or if the wavelengths are incompatible, it can drive the recipient mad within days. And even if that doesn't spur Madness, the centuries of life can. It was this magic that created Kishin Asura. But if done right, it can create a lifelong friend, such as Eibon was for me," he added softly.

Kid's eyes again ripped away from the girl and were turned to his father. It was a part of his fathers soul that had been destroyed with Asura - more, it was his father's soul that had created a Kishin?

"You made eight Wraiths?"

"It was as many as I could without weakening my power, though several of them died at the hads of Asura" His father said, a sad look upon his face. "Your count will likely be higher."

"So you're telling me… if I let her have a fragment of my soul, that she'll stay alive?" he asked. "But that she can be killed again?"

"Unless there's another Kishin as powerful as Asura or she runs afoul of a Death Scythe, she will remain alive and with the same appearance as she has today for the rest of her life, which is potentially as long as yours," Stein supplied, taking another drag on his cigarette. "Down to the very last eyelash."

Kid was about to respond with a resounding 'yes, yes a thousand times', but he caught his tongue.

"What does she say on it?" he asked, glancing over to his father for the first time. "Does she agree to stay alive for the next millennia, or does she want to be sent on to Judgment?"

"That's the lesson, Kiddo," Lord Death said, his voice gravelly. "You have to decide."

* * *

**Badda-boom! Three chapters in and I finally get somewhere! **

**So, I doubt there are many surprises in the next chapter. The summary kinda gives stuff away… Well, rest assured, it'll be fairly useless after a few chapters. Except for a little plot device off the starboard bow… WOOT plot device! ****Godda luv dem!**

**Thanks again to all of my lovely reviewers!**

**May I say, without a review being left, I'll never be able to check out YOUR stories in return for you reading mine. So don't just favorite or follow; I don't really check them quite as much. Reviews get me to review other people in turn.**

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